Tweet stopped feeding the baby when Jackie started feeding it. Jackie started a new nest and ignored the baby who still needed fed. I check on them every hour and noticed that the baby had no food in it's belly. It was so hungry that it was pecking at crumbs on the bottom of the cage. I gave him a little applesauce to keep his sugar level up while my daughter went out to buy baby Cockatiel food. The next time I check the baby had been given a little food by Phoenix. By the time my daughter came back Phoenix had the baby full and quiet. It has been a couple of days and I guess Phoenix has adopted the baby and has been feeding it. I will keep the food in the freezer in case it is needed later.

I checked on the Cockatiels and the baby was empty again. I gave Jackie a real talking to. While talking to Jackie, Phoenix did the one eye ball thing down at the baby. The next time I walked in the baby was full and Phoenix was on the bottom with it eating as much as he could as fast as he could. I do love Phoenix. Tommy and Tammy would have fed him but they are in the process of destroying a box to turn into a nest. Shadow is now odd man out. My flock is very strange.

I have been suplimating the little guys food intake. He is big enough now to find his mouth. Without being fed enough he had started pecking like the older birds. Phoenix is the only one feeding him and is now getting tired of it. He does not open his mouth like other babies. I have to touch his beak to make him open up.

Way back when I did not discourage nesting of my two pair only one would hatch eggs. When the babies left the nest they become flock responsibility and could beg from any adult besides their own parents.

I have seen this in the wild too. I raised a baby starling. When he was old enough to fly I would put him outside with the starling flock that visited every day. The flock did not know the baby but he would be fed by anyone he begged from.

The mom stopped feeding it first. Then the grandmom desided to nest and rejected the baby. Of all the flock only Phoenix (handicapped by a cut wing) has stepped in to feed it. Although the baby cannot eat on it's own yet Phoenix has stopped feeding it during the day but fills it up at bedtime. Since this flock does not know they need to feed the begging baby I have had to do supplemental feeding.

The baby only has flight feathers. It did not grow anything more but down. He took flight out of the cage and I found him following Tommy and Tammy on the floor. I put him back but he flew out again. I had to latch the door at his level. They are loose in my son's guest room with too many places to hide.

Put out some soft food twice a day, he might start pecking at it. But get yourself a feeding syringe, just in case. Oh, and by the way, the parents touch the sides of the babies beaks for them to open up and get fed.

Actually, it's very easy. You give them good nests as soon as you see breeding behaviors. Then you check in them every morning and, when you find a new egg (every other day), you just replace it with a fake one. My lovebird is sitting on five eggs right now (her second clutch), I did not have fake ones in their size so I hardboiled them and put them back. She doesn't seem to know the difference (some birds do, though, and would throw them away after a few days but most of them accept them) and everybody is happy: she gets to sit on them, her husband gets to feed her in the nest and I don't get babies.